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Serafina Cuomo

An abacus (ἄβαξ, ἀβάκιον), a counting board, was the usual aid to reckoning in antiquity. The Greeks and Romans alike used a board with vertical columns, on which (working from right to left) units, ...
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An abacus (ἄβαξ, ἀβάκιον), a counting board, was the usual aid to reckoning in antiquity. The Greeks and Romans alike used a board with vertical columns, on which (working from right to left) units, tens, and hundreds; or (where money was in question) units of currency, for instance the Attic signs for ⅛ obol, ¼ obol, ½ obol, 1 obol, drachma and so on, could be inscribed. The Salamis abacus is an example of a type of flat, large counting board, made of stone, of which more than twenty have survived from antiquity (Figure 1).There are also significantly fewer examples of small, bronze abacus. (Figure 2).The extant flat, large counting boards have been found in the Greek-speaking part of the Mediterranean, whereas the small bronze abaci appear to originate in the Roman world, and are engraved with Roman numerals. There are different possible reconstructions of how calculations were carried out on the ancient Greek or Roman abacus, which would seem to indicate that different procedures were also in use in antiquity In general, with addition, the totals of the columns were carried to the left, as in ordinary 21st-century addition.Less

Alan H. Griffiths

Abaris, legendary devotee of *Apollo from the far north, a shamanistic missionary and saviour-figure like *Aristeas whom *Pindar (fr. 270 Snell–Maehler) associated with the time of *Croesus—perhaps ...
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Abaris, legendary devotee of *Apollo from the far north, a shamanistic missionary and saviour-figure like *Aristeas whom *Pindar (fr. 270 Snell–Maehler) associated with the time of *Croesus—perhaps in connection with the king's miraculous rescue from the pyre and translation to the *Hyperboreans. Herodotus, ending his discussion of the latter (4. 36), tantalizes by refusing to say more than that ‘he carried the arrow around the whole world while fasting’ (cf. the mission of *Triptolemus, and *Demeter's search for Persephone).Less

James Maxwell Ross Cormack and Nicholas Geoffrey Lemprière Hammond

Abdera, a flourishing Greek city east of the Nestus river on the coast of *Thrace (Diod. Sic. 13. 72. 2). It was traditionally founded as a colony of *Clazomenae in 654 bce, a date for which ...
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Abdera, a flourishing Greek city east of the Nestus river on the coast of *Thrace (Diod. Sic. 13. 72. 2). It was traditionally founded as a colony of *Clazomenae in 654 bce, a date for which 7th-cent. Greek pottery affords some support. It was reoccupied by colonists from *Teos (among them *Anacreon) in the second half of the 6th cent. (Hdt. 1. 168; Pind. Paean 2); its site was near Bulustra, a corruption of the name it bore in the Middle Ages, Polystylon. Like *Aenus, Abdera owed its wealth (it was the third richest city in the *Delian League, with a contribution of 15 talents) to its corn production (see the coins), and to the fact that it was a port for the trade of inland Thrace and especially of the Odrysian rulers. Abdera was a resting-place for the army of Xerxes in 480 bce when it was marching to invade Greece (Hdt.Less

Robert Sallares

Abortion was controversial in antiquity. Doctors taking the Hippocratic Oath (see hippocrates (2)) swore not to administer abortifacients, but other Hippocratic texts suggest that prostitutes (see ...
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Abortion was controversial in antiquity. Doctors taking the Hippocratic Oath (see hippocrates (2)) swore not to administer abortifacients, but other Hippocratic texts suggest that prostitutes (see prostitution, secular) often employed abortion. A *Lysias fragment suggests that abortion was a crime in Athens against the husband, if his wife was pregnant when he died, since his unborn child could have claimed the estate. Greek temple inscriptions show that abortion made a woman impure for 40 days (see pollution).The Stoics (see stoicism) believed that the foetus resembled a plant and only became an animal at birth when it started breathing. This attitude made abortion acceptable. Roman jurisprudence maintained that the foetus was not autonomous from the mother's body. There is no evidence for laws against abortion during the Roman republic. It was common during the early Roman empire (e.g. Ov. Am. 2. 14), and was practised for many reasons, e.g. for family limitation, in case of *adultery, or because of a desire to maintain physical beauty.Less

Stephen Mitchell

Was the best harbour on the Asiatic side of the *Hellespont. In the Iliad (2. 836) an ally of Troy and then a Thracian settlement, it was colonized c.700 bce by Milesians (see ...
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Was the best harbour on the Asiatic side of the *Hellespont. In the Iliad (2. 836) an ally of Troy and then a Thracian settlement, it was colonized c.700 bce by Milesians (see colonization, greek; miletus). From 514 it was under Persian control and served in 480 as the Asiatic bridgehead from which *Xerxes crossed into Europe (Hdt. 7. 34, 43 ff.). Thereafter it was successively part of the *Athenian empire until it revolted in 411 (Thuc. 8. 61–2), a Spartan ally until 394, and under Persian rule again until freed by *Alexander (3) the Great in 334. It put up heroic resistance when besieged by *Philip (3) V of Macedon in 200 (Polybius 16. 29–34). In Roman times and in late antiquity it was an important customs-station (OGI521). There are no significant archaeological remains at the site, but its coinage, including early electrum issues, is important.

D. Sedley

Academy, public *gymnasium at Athens, sacred to the hero Academus, north-west of the Dipylon gate. It gave its name to the school founded there by *Plato (1) in the early 4th cent. and maintained by ...
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Academy, public *gymnasium at Athens, sacred to the hero Academus, north-west of the Dipylon gate. It gave its name to the school founded there by *Plato (1) in the early 4th cent. and maintained by an unbroken line of successors until the 1st cent. bce. The school's private property was never there, but, at least during the 4th cent., at Plato's nearby house.The Early Academy is the phase of doctrinal Platonism under Plato himself (d. 347) and his successors *Speusippus, *Xenocrates (1), *Polemon (2), and Crates.The ‘New Academy’ is the phase, from c.269 to the early or mid-1st cent. bce (its further subdivision, Sext. Emp. Pyr. 1. 220, is a later imposition), in which the school, initially under *Arcesilaus (1), interpreted true Platonism as scepticism. Dialectical criticism of doctrines, usually Stoic, was orchestrated to demonstrate akatalēpsia, the impossibility of knowledge, resulting in epochē, suspension of judgement.Less

Emily Kearns

Acamas, son of *Theseus and brother of *Demophon (1). Unknown to the Iliad, the brothers are certainly present at Troy in the Iliu Persis (fr. 4 Davies), and free their grandmother *Aethra from her ...
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Acamas, son of *Theseus and brother of *Demophon (1). Unknown to the Iliad, the brothers are certainly present at Troy in the Iliu Persis (fr. 4 Davies), and free their grandmother *Aethra from her servitude there. They share other adventures in the later mythological tradition; when young, they are sent to Euboea for safety, and on their return from Troy both are connected with the seizure of the *Palladium and involuntary homicide.Less

Simon Hornblower

Was probably a 7th-cent. colony of *Andros (Thuc. 4. 84) near the narrowest point of the Akte prong of *Chalcidice, and thus close to the canal dug in 480 bce on the orders of *Xerxes I of Persia ...
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Was probably a 7th-cent. colony of *Andros (Thuc. 4. 84) near the narrowest point of the Akte prong of *Chalcidice, and thus close to the canal dug in 480 bce on the orders of *Xerxes I of Persia (Hdt. 7. 22; Thuc. 4. 109); at this time it was an important Persian base. It remained loyal to Athens for much of the 5th cent. (paying a normal tribute of 3 talents in the *Delian League), until 424 when it was famously seduced by the rhetoric of the Spartan *Brasidas (Thuc. 4.85–7 for the speech, a tour de force), though Thuc. also drily notes (4. 88) that the Acanthians were concerned for their grape-vintage which Brasidas had threatened to destroy. Thuc. 4. 124. 1 (separate mention of Acanthians and Chalcidians in Brasidas' army) implies that like *Torone, Acanthus was not at this time a member of the Chalcidic League (see chalcidice).Less

W. M. Murray

Acarnan, eponym of *Acarnania. He was the son, with Amphoterus, of Callirhoë (the daughter of Acheloüs) and *Alcmaeon (1) (who had settled in the *Achelous floodplain to escape the *Erinyes). Later, ...
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Acarnan, eponym of *Acarnania. He was the son, with Amphoterus, of Callirhoë (the daughter of Acheloüs) and *Alcmaeon (1) (who had settled in the *Achelous floodplain to escape the *Erinyes). Later, when Alcmaeon was murdered by the sons of *Phegeus, Callirhoë begged *Zeus to age her sons prematurely so they might avenge their father's murder.Less

W. M. Murray

Acarnania, a district of NW Greece, bounded by the Lonian Sea, the gulf of Ambracia, and the *Acheloüs river. The district is divided into three main regions: (1) a rugged coast with small bays and ...
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Acarnania, a district of NW Greece, bounded by the Lonian Sea, the gulf of Ambracia, and the *Acheloüs river. The district is divided into three main regions: (1) a rugged coast with small bays and small alluvial plains,(2) a mountainous interior range that parallels the coast from north-west to south-east, and(3) small plains between the mountains and the Acheloüs river to the east.Although Neolithic, early Helladic, and late Helladic remains have been located near Astacus and elsewhere, evidence for widespread prehistoric settlement is lacking. Homer seems ignorant of the region except as a part of the shadowy ‘mainland’ inside *Ithaca, although names like Melite and Marathus may point to *Phoenician seafarers using this coast for shelter on their westward voyages. Significant Greek influence began during the 7th cent. bce when *Corinth settled Anactorium, Sollium, and Leucas and when (soon thereafter?) *Cephallenia settled Astacus. *Thucydides (2) mentions settlements at Alyzeia, Astacus, Coronta, Limnaea, Medion, *Oeniadae, Palaerus, Phytia (Phoetiae), and Stratus, some of which were surely fortified poleis (Oeniadae, Stratus, Astacus, Palaerus).Less